


A Shipwreck Off Llomerryn

by ghostwise



Category: Dragon Age (Video Games), Dragon Age: Origins
Genre: Angst, Canon-Typical Violence, Gen, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-11-24
Updated: 2018-11-24
Packaged: 2019-08-28 18:02:49
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,949
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16728240
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ghostwise/pseuds/ghostwise
Summary: Zevran is not prepared to see Taliesen again.





	A Shipwreck Off Llomerryn

He becomes aware of his presence the same way one might notice a change in temperature, or the first drop of a rainstorm. There, in the corner of his eye, in the backdrop.

Denerim is a large city, but Zevran is certain Taliesen has not been trailing them for long. He is also certain that Taliesen is not foolish enough to force a public confrontation. Still, he cannot linger by the market stalls, avoiding him forever, and as he tries to act natural around the others, Zevran feels a growing apprehension.

This is something he has to deal with alone. So, with a hastily made up excuse, he steps away from the group and lets his feet guide him at a harried pace, half-thinking, looking for somewhere secluded.

He finds a little alley, lined in dirt, the sort that is never quite in full sunlight, with shuttered doors and empty windows, and it is here that Taliesen finally approaches him.

Zevran tried to prepare himself for this, but he still finds himself shaken at the sight of him.

Taliesen has changed little since he last saw him; he is still scruffy, tall, dark haired. Perhaps the bags under his eyes are new, but he still has the same smile, lopsided, lifting the corners of his mouth, as if he is happy to see him. As if he missed him.

“Can it be? Is that him? It is! The great Zevran Arainai, in the flesh,” Taliesen jokes, and that is the same, too.

“Taliesen,” Zevran says. “Tell me, were you sent after me? Or did you volunteer?”

“So quick to the chase! Is this how you greet an old friend?”

“Nothing friendly is going to happen today, I assure you.”

Hearing that, Taliesen’s smile falters, and for a moment he looks almost confused. “Well,” he says finally. “I suppose I cannot blame you for being upset. To answer your question: I volunteered. I came all the way here to this backwater country, for you, darling.”

“Do not call me that.”

Taliesen looks away, laughing softly, a sound that quickly tapers into silence.

“We all thought you were dead, Zevran. Imagine my surprise when I heard that you were very much alive. That you’d gone rogue. You abandoned us-”

“If that is what you are here for, I will stop you there. I am not coming back.”

“Zevran,” Taliesen looks at him imploringly. “I understand why you did this. I know how you feel, and I do not blame you.” He steps closer, holding his arms out, trying again to smile. “Come back with me. We’ll make up a story. I’ll cover for you. What do you say?”

Zevran remains stock still. He does not move away, but simply stands there, glaring.

“Anyone can make a mistake,” Taliesen says.

“I made the greatest mistake of my life already. I will _not_ repeat it,” Zevran assures him.

“Ah… you mean, trusting me?”

He at least has the decency to look upset. Taliesen sighs and slumps against the wall behind him, looking at the ground. An uneasy silence falls around them. He looks so lost. Zevran is not buying the act.

When he speaks again, he sounds uncharacteristically meek.

“You know, I've been alone,” Taliesen says slowly. “For the first time since the wreck... I've been alone.”

Zevran can barely look at him.

His mind flashes back to the terrified young boy Taliesen once was, freshly plucked off the coast of Llomerryn after his family perished in a shipwreck. How a young Zevran and a young Taliesen had banded together, and pulled through the trials— _call it what it is: torture_ —of becoming a Crow.

His mind is at odds with the hateful tenderness that rises up in him, and the grief and anger and hurt of all that has happened. The strength of the feeling shocks him, and he has to restrain himself from his urge to sock Taliesen in the face, hard enough to break something.

Zevran takes a deep breath, but he still cannot look at him as he grits out, “You should have thought of that _before_ you slit her throat.”

“You were as much a part of it as I was,” Taliesen shoots back. “You were complicit. You watched me do it. You _spat_ on her as she bled out on the mattress.” Then Taliesen's voice softens, and he is back to the gentle and cajoling man who once could convince him of anything. “Zevran, _por favor_. Let us not fight. I only want to talk, yes?”

If there is a Hell, they are both going there, Zevran thinks.

Suddenly, Leliana comes up behind him, jovial and laughing, breaking the spell.

“Oh, there you are! We were looking for you.”

Both Zevran and Taliesen look to her as she joins Zevran at his side. Close behind, Warden Mahariel is with her, smiling easily. Zevran closes his eyes, willing this not to happen, even as it unfolds.

“… Who is your friend?” Leliana asks.

The dynamic has shifted instantly. Taliesen slips out of the informal mask he'd approached Zevran with. No longer familiar and intimate, he steps back, smiling. His posture is alert, his eyes, dashing back and forth, regarding Hamal and Leliana.

“The Maker must have guided me today,” Taliesen says. “The Grey Warden himself, here, at long last!”

Hamal raises an eyebrow, looking Taliesen up and down. “You’ve heard of me,” he notes. “But that’s hardly anything special. Who are you, exactly?”

“Oh, I’m nobody!” Taliesen laughs, looking at Zevran. “I suppose I shouldn’t be surprised to find you keep such company, Zev. You do know you don’t have to sleep with _all_ your marks, right?”

His anger flares up against his better judgment, words coming out in a rush. _“Maldito pedazo de mierda-”_

He hates that Taliesen can still get to him like this. It is better not to react at all to his taunts, but to be frank, the fact that he has not attacked him already shows remarkable restraint.

Meanwhile, if the Warden is surprised or offended, he is not showing it. In fact, for a long moment, he is uncharacteristically quiet. He moves forward, chin up, looking directly at Taliesen.

“Right. I don’t give a shit who you are, actually. Let me enlighten you, shem,” he states evenly. “You will turn around, and you will leave. We will not see you again, or hear from your kith. A very generous offer, considering the disrespect you’ve shown my friend.”

“You should know, Antivan Crows are hard to intimidate,” Taliesen chuckles.

“Is it intimidation, or is it sense?” Hamal shrugs lightly as he says it. “I know who you are. It does not change a thing.”

“Oh I can see why you like him,” Talieisin says to Zevran, smiling. “He’s plucky. Not for long, though.”

The threat is enough to kick Zevran into motion, as his priorities shift from restraining his anger, to protecting the Warden. “You are mistaken, Taliesen. I am not going with you, and I am not letting you do a damn thing to him.”

“Sooo dramatic!” Taliesen laughs, incredulous. “You’ve really gone soft.”

But that is where he is wrong. Zevran feels, again, that urge to break Taliesen’s face using only his hands, to silence that laughter with just his fists. He was soft when he let Taliesen kill Rinna, someone he cared about. He was soft when he let himself be manipulated and molded to the whims of the Crows, a group that never had his or Rinna’s or even Taliesen’s best interests in mind.

He was soft when he loved them, both of them, in their own way. Stunted, like a bird with clipped wings, but caring enough to believe that somehow, they would be together through anything.

Soft, naïve, stupid Zevran.

He is not soft now.

“You should have stayed in Antiva,” he says, dead serious, cold, like steel.

They act in concert. Taliesen signals for the others of his group to leap in—of course he wasn’t alone, Crows travel in flocks—and Hamal already has his bow in hand, felling two of their number before the fight starts proper. Leliana does not hold back in her advance, appearing beside Taliesen swift as a shadow, striking—but he is just as fast, dodges, reels back, shifts his momentum and launches at her.

Zevran intervenes, his blades countering each blow aimed at Leliana and Hamal. He will not allow his friends to come to harm because of what he has done.

But they are dreadfully outnumbered as well.

“Take out the archer!” One of Taliesen’s men shouts, and it is almost laughably familiar. It is exactly what Zevran had said, when he’d first set eyes on Hamal Mahariel, watching him fire arrows with almost supernatural speed.

There is no time to have an emotional response to this. Zevran flings a dagger in the direction of that voice, hears a responding grunt of pain, and moves on to the next target.

Hampered by the close quarters in the alley, the Warden struggles to dodge an onslaught of attacks. Someone launches a volley of arrows at him. Hamal catches one and fires it back, but another buries itself in his left shoulder. He wrenches it out, furious, draws and aims it at Taliesen with a muffled Dalish curse.

It finds its target with a thump, but Taliesen barely winces. He is far too focused on bringing Zevran down, and the fight winds on around them, the Crows’ numbers dwindling.

Surely Taliesen can see the numbers turning against him. The Grey Wardens are not regarded as fearsome for nothing, and Leliana is a great benefit to them, fighting like a woman possessed.

Unexpectedly, Taliesen ducks and sweeps a leg under Zevran, attempting to knock him down. It does not work, but it gives Taliesen the fraction of a second he needed to turn and take on the Warden.

Hamal readies an arrow just as Taliesen plunges his short sword, and both weapons find their targets. Swords are much larger than arrows, though.

The Warden reels back, bloodied. Leliana is at his side instantly, but the battle ends as abruptly as it began. Zevran knocks Taliesen back, finally throwing that punch he has been waiting for, his knuckles connecting squarely under his jawbone.

He collapses, stunned, and Zevran pins him down, straddling him, his hands a vice around his neck.

“Zevran,” Taliesen chokes out. He tries to draw air, but is unable to, his head already swimming. “ _Por favor... Zevran_.”

“ _No_ ,” Zevran says through gritted teeth. “ _Vete al **puto** infierno. Ve, y suplicale a Rinna cuando llegues._”

Young, seafaring Taliesen dies in a filthy alley in Denerim, staring into a pair of hateful eyes. Zevran crushes his windpipe and watches the light leave him.

Dimly, he is aware of someone talking to him. When the sound finally breaks through whatever barrier exists between him and the rest of the world, he looks up and sees Leliana, bleeding from a cut above her eye, shouting.

“Zevran. Zevran!”

Zevran looks at her, and releases his grip on Taliesen’s throat. Bodies slump lifelessly in the streets, and there’s blood on the ground around them: hers, Hamal’s, Taliesen’s, but Zevran himself has sustained barely a scratch, and it’s not _fair_.

“Zevran!” Leliana tries again. “Go get Wynne!”

A breath rakes through Zevran’s body, suddenly jolting him fully back. He stumbles to his feet, looks at the unconscious Warden. Leliana is holding pressure onto his largest wound. Most of the blood seems to be his. Leliana looks desperate.

_“Hurry!”_

Zevran turns and runs.

If there is a Hell, he is in it. He is burning, as he goes.


End file.
